I can't imagine that Congressman Jay Obernolte would treat the systematic removal of experienced senior military leaders like background noise. That silence would not be a neutral act. It would be a political choice. It would be a decision that says: “I will look away while the scaffolding of American defense is dismantled.”
This is the sort of silence that should make any voter — conservative, moderate, or liberal — angry. Military readiness is not a partisan talking point. It is not a convenient backdrop for cable-news sound bites. It’s the difference between deterrence and chaos, between a clear chain of command and a brittle, politicized substitute. When a cascade of firings and abrupt removals of senior officers occurs from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs to intelligence directors and other four-star leaders —the republic deserves more than the faint chirp of a perfunctory press office; it deserves vigorous, public scrutiny from every member of Congress, including Rep. Jay Obernolte.
What are we to make of a representative who stays muted while President Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth take a sledgehammer to our readiness? Removing the institutional memory and technical expertise of senior officers risks long-term damage to force readiness and strategic planning. Silence in that moment is not prudence. It’s abdication.
The consequences are plain and immediate. Experienced commanders hold the institutional knowledge of multi-theater operations, interagency coordination, and the hard-won professional norms that keep the military distinct from partisan politics. Sweeping personnel decisions that look like political retribution or partisan re-engineering carried out without transparent justification — do one thing well: they sap morale. That erosion of trust is corrosive, and it takes years to repair.
Silence is a choice. The voters of CA-23 deserve to know whether Rep. Jay Obernolte will defend the apolitical professionalism of the military he represents, or whether he will quietly go along with this madness.
If Representative Obernolte values the trust his constituents place in him, he will do what all responsible members of Congress must do in the face of an unprecedented shakeup: demand transparency, demand accountability, and demand a hearing for the facts — publicly. Anything less is surrendering oversight to power and leaving national security to the whims of political expedience.
Photo by Oleg Ivanov on Unsplash
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